Microsoft Word language assessment theory with practice

3.1.2. Intensive (Controlled) Writing 
Intensive writing has also been called ‘controlled’, ‘form-focused’, 
‘grammar’ and ‘guided’ writing (Brown & Abeywickrama, 2019; Heaton, 
1990; Zulkifli, 2017). As the names suggest, these writing tasks aim to 
probe students’ competence in grammar, sentence formation or vocabulary 
while conveying meaning for authentic purposes is only partially the focus. 
Traditional tasks where students are asked to display their ability to 
construct grammatically correct sentences and/or use vocabulary items, 
collocations and idioms by combining the given prompts correctly within 
highly controlled contexts are examples of intensive writing. Test takers are 
not expected to create or pass new information from one person to another 
in such tasks. Instead, they have to show that they know the specific rules 
the exercise is focusing on. Such assessment tasks are reliable, practical and 
allow for clear comparison between the students.
The most frequently used controlled writing assessment tasks are 
dictations, a dicto-comp, grammatical transformation, vocabulary 
assessment, ordering, short answer, sentence completion tasks and picture 
cued tasks (e.g., short sentences, picture description, picture sequence 
description). Intensive writing tools are good in eliciting the required 
information as long as students are familiar with the task and know exactly 
what is expected from them. Therefore, test writers should ensure that the 
instructions accompanying those tasks are short, clear, and easy to 
understand and are followed by at least one example.
Examples 5a and 5b show how a Grammatical Transformation Task 
can be used as a formative assessment tool uncovering what students have 
mastered and what they still need to learn. The grammatical transformation 
tasks are reliable, easy to administer and valid. When designed well, they 
uncover learners’ ‘real ability’ to produce the forms in focus. However, it 
should be kept in mind that these tasks are ‘virtually devoid of any 
meaningful value’ (Brown & Abeywickrama, 2019, p. 236).
The task presented in Examples 5a and 5b is also designed to help 
students evaluate their own and their peers’ knowledge of the topic and 
provide valuable feedback for the teacher to take more practical and more 
beneficial steps.

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Assessment of Language Skills: Productive Skills
187 
Example 5a: Intensive Writing: Grammar Transformation Tasks 
Level: 
A1-A2 (Grade 6) [Note: This exercise was designed for Grade 6 
students, but it can be modified to fit the needs of students at all levels. 
] 
Topic: